The practice of fly-fishing typically requires the fisherman to make some sort of tension resisting connection between the weighted fly line (normally tapered, and coated with a semi-resilient polymer) and a leader line (clear or slightly tinted) to which the artificial fly, nymph or other fish attracting lure is terminally attached. These two lines, the fly-line and leader-line are designed with very different attributes and are not most effectively or reliably connected to each other using knots, even those developed specifically for this purpose.
This fly line to leader connection problem is addressed by a number of prior art devices, all of which have inherent advantages and disadvantages. One of the best prior art solutions is disclosed in detail in the U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,717,907 and 3,834,061. These patents disclose a small, flexible plastic link with transverse openings at each end to receive the leader and fly line respectively. The line ends are threaded through these transverse openings to project through a side opening in the link. The extending line ends are then both tied in knots that are then trimmed and pulled back into the link where they are held secure. This leader connector device is reasonably reliable in maintaining tension between the two lines when the knots are carefully tied. In practice, it is often fairly difficult to re-insert the knot end of the fly line back into the link, due to the size interference between the fly line knot and the link slot. It is often necessary to try and strip off some of the fly line surface coating before tying the knot in an attempt to reduce the overall knot size, but this is difficult to do without damaging the tensile bearing core. There is sometimes the additional problem of tying the leader knot with a sufficient cross section to keep it from being pulled transversely through the link. The practical necessity to tie an overhand knot in the fly line and a clinch knot in the leader and then to seat these knots within the very confined space of the link slot along with the relatively large link diameter (as compared to the fishing lines) has made this fly-line to leader link a less than desirable solution to a large number of fly fishing practitioners.
Currently, the most popular fly line to leader connection device is referred to as a “braided loop”. These braided loops are somewhat difficult to install as they must be progressively expanded and pulled (teased) over the terminal end of the fly line. Once installed, they are held secure to the fly line in the same manner that a woven “Chinese finger trap” (children's novelty toy) grips a finger. This gripping action works to secure these braided loops because the polymer coating of the fly line has a semi-resilient surface covering. This semi-resilient surface allows the braided mesh to grip the line when the braided loop and fly line are placed in tension. Unfortunately, installing these braided loops always results in the fraying of the braided tubular opening of the device. This frayed end must be covered with a heat shrink or elastic tubing to keep it from further fraying and to prevent the frayed edge from getting snagged on the fishing rod guides or other obstructions or snags as typically encountered while fishing. Failure to cover this frayed end will typically result in the braided loop being pulled off the fly line. The installation difficulties and performance drawbacks of the braided loops are actually more serious than the fly line to leader connector links as described above, but they remain very popular. There are numerous other connector devices in the prior art for connecting the fly fishing line to the leader line but they use structurally rigid clamping jaws or external barbs (U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,864,767 and 5,469,652) to secure them to the fly line. In order to maintain sufficient clamping pressure or structural rigidity to keep the ridges or barbs engaged, these connectors are larger and heavier than is desirable for use with fly fishing lines. There are also some specialized fly lines and leaders with a built in connection means (U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,469,652 and 6,880,289). These specialized connecting lines have to be used exclusively with each other, and as a result are limiting to the flexibility of line and leader setup by the fisherman. These specialized devices also tend to be larger in size than is desirable. None of the prior art connection devices makes use of a light, flexible, compressively expandable tubular lattice structure to make a reliable, in-line, and very streamlined connection between the fly line and leader line.
The prior art braided loops will be described in more detail in the accompanying Detailed Description section with reference to the “prior art” patent application FIGS. 1 through 3. The instant Fly Line Connecting Device is described in the accompanying Detailed Description section and the details are shown in the application FIGS. 4 through 24.